Glyphland

Monday, April 07, 2008

Appalachian State. Every one of Michigan's rivals (and, frankly, the rest of the planet) loves them some Appalachian State after The Horror, but State fans latched on to it harder than anyone else. Ohio State fans have their own -- for a given definition of "own", anyway -- accomplishments to brag on. Penn State fans have a decade of futility against Michigan and shreds of dignity and self-awareness. And Notre Dame would have lost to Appalachian State by 30. After a brief whooping period they kind of got over it.

State is long-plagued by similar upsets -- Louisiana Tech, Rutgers before that was respectable, Central Michigan, Central Michigan again -- and improbable snatch-defeat-from-jaws-of-victory losses -- oh, God, too many to name -- so for Michigan to finally get the short end of the stick was sweet, sweet justice. Go to Michigan State's campus in the fall and you'll see so many people wearing black and yellow that you'll pull out a roadmap and mutter "how the f&#$ did I end up in Boone, North Carolina?"

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Wooo, motherfuckers, woo.

Talking about how hot the chicks are. Approach any Michigan State fan, grad, or provost and mention the words "Michigan," "Ann Arbor," or "University," and you will immediately be regaled with a dual-part homily. Part A will describe the Michigan acceptance letter the fan, grad, or provost has framed upon their wall. Part B will be a rousing encomium to the ladies of Michigan State.

Even the women will do this. It does not matter that this fan, grad, or provost might, say, be a 180 pound 5'2" woman, or, more commonly, a moderately in-shape girl with a blond dye job and a face Sarah Jessica Parker would find unpleasantly equine. She will regale you with tales of all the hot poon available for any brah with a barbed-wire tattoo and a 30 of Natty Ice.

Lenin's corpse: they'd hit it. They would reanimate it with their genitals, brah!

Sand: they'd hit it.

The Crab Nebula: they'd hit it. It's all nova and shit.

Notre Dame Stadium. Michigan State -- MICHIGAN STATE -- has not lost at Notre Dame since 1993, a streak of six games. During that time Notre Dame has usually been somewhere between mediocre and flailingly bad, but that still has to be one of the weirdest current records in college football. I haven't bothered to look this up, but I'm willing to bet the only other teams that share that distinction with Notre Dame are teams State hasn't played since '93.

Rioting. This was going to be a cheap shot based on some long ago Final Four shenanigans until some of the brahs obliged over the weekend:

There isn't a group this side of Palestine more acquainted with the sweet smell of tear gas. I hear the Dupont '95 is developing a lovely honeyed nose, but the East Lansing police insist on using crap from South America that's well past its peak.

Update: Dude, Brah, it was intense:

Strapped like the Navy. Make sure to check the comments out.Basketball. This is natural when you're the "state" -- or, like, "commonwealth" in Virginia -- school in any state with a flagship U-of that consistently beats the hell out of you in football, but State fans take it to a preposterous extreme. Anecdotal evidence from just last week: after Michigan took out Clarkson we decided to hang around the bar we were at for a while to catch a portion of the CC-Michigan State game, Michigan State being the one team Michigan did not want to face at any point during the tournament. At the same time, Derrick Rose and company were busy beating the everliving hell out of Michigan State.

Ann Arbor is the reluctant home of many Spartan fans and the owners of this place are alums, I believe, so the place was packed with brahs, all of whom looked like... well, probably a lot like I did during this year's Ohio State game. They were purely miserable. Meanwhile, the hockey team was a huge underdog -- a third place CCHA team playing the WCHA champs at altitude on an Olympic rink on their home ice -- and scored. No reaction whatsoever from anyone except the Michigan fans still around. They scored again. No reaction. At this point we start pointing at the televisions carrying the hockey game and begging them to pay attention to their very successful hockey team that's about to pull off a killer upset. It's halftime. Michigan State is down 30 to Memphis. And no one even looks when State scores again, because hearing Clark Kellogg say something like "JESUS CHRIST, if there are any women or children watching please turn on EWTN" is more important than actual success.

Michigan State's hockey team is the defending national champions.

I'm not sure if this is a compliment or an insult or what, but at this point State basketball fans are basically Michigan football fans, except with more brah, brah.

Anyone who does anything that harms or slightly inconveniences the University of Michigan in any way. See: Appalachian State.

300. Every Michigan fan who made the unwise decision to watch "300" spent the entire running time thinking two things: "my God those are some oily, slow-moving sixpacks," and "goddammit I bet whenever I go to a Michigan State sporting event, party, or commencement they're going to reference this movie in a really annoying fashion."